Needle safety has long been a concern of health care professionals. The recent spread of infections diseases such as Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) has changed a needle prick from a minor irritation to a potentially fatal injury.
Medical needles generally are covered by a protective cap when not in use. When the needle is so covered, it presents little to no possibility of a health care professional being pricked by the needle. A danger is created from the instant that the needle is removed from its protective cap.
Current medical practice calls for the removal of all needles from a patient during an emergency. These needles are removed from the patent and are often threaded through a bedsheet or disposed of in devices described below. By threading a needle into a bedsheet, a health care professional may be accidentally pricked while caring for the patient. Occasionally, these needles are forgotten and end up pricking someone responsible for the care and maintenance of the linens.
In an attempt to reduce the potential for needle pricks, several devices have been created. These devices fall into two general categories, needle disposal devices and needle guards.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,989,307, Sharpe et al., discloses a needle disposal device. This device comprises an orifice for accepting needle tips, a rotational device for removing the needle tips, and a bag for accepting the unattached needle tips. This device requires that a health care professional place the needle tip into a small orifice and that a switch be manipulated to remove the needle tip from the rest of the assembly. In an emergency, it is rarely possible to have the time necessary to place the needle carefully into the small orifice. Thus, a needle prick may occur while trying to dispose of the needle within a small orifice.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,944,069, Eldridge, and 4,758,229, Doerschner, disclose needle disposal devices comprising a pair of foldable pads. The pads have a penetration resistant outer coatings which when folded over the needle prevents further contact with the needle. These devices require that a health care professional remove a needle and place it horizontally upon the pad. Then the professional would fold the pad over so as to cover the needle. Thus, two hands must be used to dispose of the needle. This exposes the health care professional to the needle tip several times.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,981,476, Aichlmayr et al. discloses a needle guard which comprises a cap which is spring biased to close when the needle is extracted from a patient. This needle guard has the disadvantage of being difficult to use when initially inserting the needle into the patient. By having to pull back the guard upon inserting the needle into the patient, a health care professional's hand is exposed to the needle area. This increases the likelihood of an accidental needle prick.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,927,415, Brodsky, discloses a needle guard which comprises a needle, a hollow tube surrounding a part of the needle, a pulling member attached to the needle and passing through the hollow tube, and a closable end on the hollow tube. The device operates by a health care professional pulling upon the pulling member. This in turn causes the needle to withdraw past the closable end of the hollow tube and be secured within the hollow tube. This device requires that a health care professional use two hands to dispose of a needle. The first hand is used to grasp the hollow tube and the second hand grasps the pulling member. In addition, the needle is left dangling while it is being pulled into the hollow tube.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,979,945, Wade et al., discloses a needle cap resheather comprising a plurality of needle caps, a clamp for holding the caps, and a means for mounting the clamp to a bed. In operation, a health care professional would reinsert a needle into one of the caps that is suspended in the clamp. This presents the problem of inserting a needle into a very small orifice and generally increases the likelihood of a needle prick.
Although all of the above-discussed devices relate to needle safety, they have various disadvantages of requiring a health care professional to insert the needle into a small orifice, reducing the useability of the needle, causing additional exposure to the needle when disposing of the needle, or requiring the health care professional to use two hands in the disposal process.